Enough of girls! I’d rather live alone

Moses Rieti

Early 16th Century

Enough of girls! I’d rather live alone
Than touch those reptiles, though they may be fair.
I’m sick and tired of wasting on the air
My strength and every penny that I own.
For once they’re mine, they think my soul’s their own.
Like dogs, they snarl and scrabble for my wares,
Bedevil me and ruin my affairs.
And so to all the world, I now intone
This my advice: Let’s finally get wise,
See women as they are—a loathsome lot!
Better to take a lion for your mate.
Let those gazelles live long and loveless lives,
Become old maids—languish, droop, and rot,
To feed the ravens and the crows their fate.

Translated by
Raymond P.
Scheindlin
.

Credits

Moses ben Joab Rieti, “Enough of girls! I’d rather live alone (Hebrew)” (Poem, Florence, early 16th century). Published in: Mivḥar ha-shira ha-Ivrit bi-Italia, ed. Jefim Schirmann (Jerusalem: Mossad Bialik, 1998), 236.

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 5.

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Creator Bio

Moses Rieti

1388–1460

Moses ben Joab Rieti was a philosopher, preacher, and poet in Florence. Rieti composed sonnets on topics as diverse as the immortality of the soul, the study of the Talmud, and the joys of sexual union; most of his writings remain in manuscript. After the fall of Florence, Rieti went into exile, composing a poem about the experience. In another poem, he lamented the death of his fellow poet Joseph Tsarfati.

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